I don't believe a word of it. These kinds of announcements tend to show up every few months, and none ever make it to market.
"There are a handful of small hurdles yet to cross in the science, but nobody seems terribly concerned."
If they were so "small" they would be solved. No, they are massive hurdles, and they have no clue what to do, so they put out a press release hoping for more money.
Plus solid sodium in your house? Talk about a fire hazard. You have an external fire which melts the casing, you dump water to put it out - and fireball.
This isn't complete pie-in-the-sky stuff. NaS batteries have been around for decades (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NaS_battery) and in fact Ford was building EVs with them in the late 90's.
It looks like they found an interesting tweak to the technology that might make it suitable for home use. It's possible (likely, even) that it will end up either too expensive or too unreliable to be practical, but it's certainly newsworthy.
"There are a handful of small hurdles yet to cross in the science, but nobody seems terribly concerned."
If they were so "small" they would be solved. No, they are massive hurdles, and they have no clue what to do, so they put out a press release hoping for more money.
Plus solid sodium in your house? Talk about a fire hazard. You have an external fire which melts the casing, you dump water to put it out - and fireball.